Back in her room after the encounter with Emrael, Jaina collapsed on her bed, unable to contain the sobs that racked her. She muffled the cries in her pillow as she forced her mind to make sense of what she was feeling.
She had known he was changed by whatever had happened to him inside the Citadel, though he still would not speak of it to her, or to anyone that she knew of. What could have hurt him to that degree? She had known pain. She had watched as her beloved Welitan had turned into an alai’ahn before her very eyes, sobbed as he was dragged away to be euthanized by their fellow Imperators. The ache she felt in Emrael rivaled what she had harbored for so long after her husband’s death. Could torture have wounded his soul so deeply? She did not think so.
Further, the immensity of the Fallen’s touch was … not what she had expected. And oddly benevolent, though Jaina was almost certain that the Fallen’s imparted energy had been trying to change or shape Emrael’s own life source in some way. She could feel the small portion she had taken upon herself doing the same to her. Her consciousness—her very being—vibrated inside of her, molding her in some way.
It terrified her that she didn’t understand what it was doing to her—to them—or why. She screamed into her pillow as she brought her full force of will to bear, finally subduing her emotions. She took a deep breath and half-stumbled over to her washbasin, where she splashed her face with cold water and scrubbed away the snot and tears.
As she toweled herself dry, the metal disk on her writing desk began to vibrate with a constant rhythm for a minute or so. One of the Ordenan Council of Imperators’ representatives here in the Provinces had recently come to the city and delivered the beacon Crafting to her, with instructions to meet at a nearby Order safehouse when summoned.
Useful as the device was, she couldn’t help but think about Banron Ire’s Observers. They transmitted actual voices, whereas the best Crafters in mighty Ordena had only managed this pulsating disk. Remarkable.
Buckling on her sword and various hidden daggers, she stopped to consume the infusori from the lighting coils in the hall just outside her room. She filled herself with the glorious power until her eyes were just shy of glowing visibly, which would immediately give her powered-up state away. She checked herself in her small mirror, then set off for the Ordenan safehouse near Whitehall’s docks.
To anyone but those who knew, the stone-block building and surrounding fenced yard looked like any other merchant’s yard in the district. Even the warehouse workers and wagoneers were legitimate. This was in fact a merchant’s yard, likely operated by someone with few or no connections to Ordena. Certainly not to the Order of Imperators or the Ordenan Councils.
Her trepidation returned as she crossed the yard and entered the office. She had no idea why, after months of uninterrupted clandestine operation and encrypted reports, the Order was contacting her now, and in such an open manner. She was following Maira’s instructions, for Mercy’s sake! A member of the Council of Imperators!
As she entered the merchant’s office, a short, portly man with only a fringe of hair ringing his head looked up from a large desk. Recognition widened his eyes immediately, and he beckoned her toward the back of the building. She didn’t like that they had given her description to low-level operatives, but followed.
She stopped at the door to a small office, shocked. At the desk inside sat her dead husband’s best friend, Jeric. Grey now streaked the temples of his sleek shoulder-length hair, and the tan skin of his face and hands had creased gently, but he had the same big-toothed grin she had seen so often when they had been assigned to the same squad in the Dark Lands. She met his smile, but the old ache of sorrow that constantly chewed at her suddenly amplified. She couldn’t see Jeric without being reminded of that day they had recovered Welitan together.
“Jer,” she blurted, unable to find any other words. “What are you doing here? I thought you were training recruits at the Academy. Are you who the Council sent to negotiate with Emrael? How did you arrive so quickly?”
Jeric was a good Imperator—better than good—and handy in a fight. However, he would not have been her first choice to negotiate a trade deal.
He threw his hands up in an exaggerated shrug. “No, I only learned about your request when I landed in Naeran. The Councils will likely be months still in replying. They will take their time assessing what they can commit to the Provinces … and their price, of course.”
Her old friend leaned forward in his seat, his gaze intense. “Jaina, I am here for you. They pulled me into an emergency meeting—pulled me out of a class, for Mercy’s sake. Next thing I knew, I was on a cruiser headed here, to talk to you. You’ve made some people on the Councils very angry. Or very excited, I cannot tell which. Probably both, knowing you.”
She showed her teeth in a smile she didn’t feel. Something was very wrong if a Councilor had sent for her without going through Maira first. Chain of command mattered a great deal in the Order. “I am only doing what they sent me here to do, what Maira Ire herself ordered me to do. I was told that I take my orders directly from her.”
He squinted at her in amusement, licking his front teeth. “Never were one for small talk, were you, Jaina? That is just as well, I do not have much time, my ship leaves this evening. The Council is concerned about the Ire boy. They would not say so right out, but I do not think they trust Maira to rein him in, and they fear you have lost control. No more soldiers are coming—I am surprised they have not recalled the Imperators already here. They want you to return to the island.”
Jaina threw her head back and laughed. “Sisters, Jer, you have no idea. Control Emrael?” She laughed again. “I tried that, at first. I thought I would have him in the palm of my hand to deliver to the Council by now. You have not met him, have not seen what he can do. None of you have. If they want to send someone else to try to put a leash on him, they are welcome to. I cannot wait to see them try. But for now, I am the Order’s best chance at maintaining some sort of relationship with him. I am staying.”
Jeric was taken aback. “You will defy orders? You were on track to be on the Council someday. If you do this…”
She stared at him, unamused. “I am obeying orders. From a Councilor, same as you. I need your help, Jer, not threats. I am too busy to be getting involved in games between Councilors.”
“Glory, Jaina. What am I supposed to do? I may be here for the Councils, but I’m still your friend first and foremost. Tell me what’s going on, tell me how I can help.”
Her mind flashed back to her conversation with Emrael earlier that day, his communion with the Fallen. The residual energy left in the boy—energy she had taken upon herself to share, for Mercy only knew what reason.
Tempted as she was to trust one of her oldest friends with what she had experienced, she knew that even he would not understand. None of the Ordenans would, not unless they had seen the truth for themselves as she had. Ordenans, and particularly the Council of Imperators, thought in stark terms. Either someone was guilty, or they were not. They would likely kill Emrael, and her, if they knew even half of the truth.
She held his gaze with her own. “We have fought dozens of Malithii and alai’ahn by the thousand already, and I suspect that is only the beginning. I need more Imperators, and soldiers who know how to fight the Westlanders. Stay here with me. Help me.”
“That is not how it works and you know it. You don’t negotiate with the Order. I can’t just decide to stay here. They would almost certainly execute me as a defector. They will have you killed too if you don’t come with me. Please, Jaina.”
“No, they won’t, Jeric. They know that Emrael is their best chance to gain a foothold in the Provinces, and they have wanted that for decades. And what if Ire really is one of the chosen the Malithii have raved about for centuries, what if the Fallen really is awake, Jer? What then? We are just supposed to lead him on a leash to a duel with a god? Do you really think that is how this will work?”
Jeric sat silent, chin resting on his hand, one finger tapping his cheek as if in thought. His other hand, however, drifted toward his belt. Jaina just now noticed the glint of copper—one of the Malithii’s copper-cable weapons. Imperators often took them from vanquished Malithii priests and used them in situations intended to be nonlethal. She had seen them used on rogue Imperators, had used them herself more than once.
Jaina kicked the table with a burst of infusori to bolster the blow. Jeric was knocked backward; his head slammed into the wall, stunning him momentarily. Jaina kicked the table again, flipping it on top of her former friend. She jumped the table to pin him with her knees as she elbowed him in the face one, two, three times in rapid succession. Blood dripped from his nose and his eye began to swell immediately, but he was still conscious. Mostly.
“What in Mercy’s name were you thinking? Trying to detain me? You thought that you could subdue me?”
“Forgot … how fast you are. Damn,” he groaned.
“Why, Jer? I am still following orders. The Council’s orders. This is not how things are done.”
Jeric was a bit more lucid now. He shook his head slightly, wincing as he did. “They really will kill you,” he grunted. “I heard them talking. You know the Council members often take matters into their own hands when fighting among themselves. My patron thinks you have let Ire get too powerful, taught him things he should not know. Someone in your party must be passing him information.”
“Who?”
Jeric shook his head and spoke quickly. “I do not know, I swear. I only know that if I take you back now, they will reprimand and replace you, but you’ll be safe. I made sure of it. I’m trying to save you, Jaina.”
“I have unfinished business here, Jeric Alloda. My place is with Emrael. Which Councilor threatened me?”
When he didn’t answer, she gripped his throat in one hand. Weakened and dazed as he was, he would not stand a chance against her in a match of wills. She could devour his life source if she wished, could mold him to her will, and he knew it.
He jerked his head as far away as he could. “Glory, Jaina. It was Yaris. He wants you gone and one of his favorites in charge here. He’s likely moving against Maira as well.”
“Did he pay you?”
Jeric was again slow to answer, but the silence was answer enough.
“Sisters damn you, Jer,” she said quietly. “This is so much larger than your petty Council politics. I’m acting on Councilor Maira’s orders, and Jer…”
She paused, considering how much to tell him. At this point, he and his patron were as good as sworn enemies anyway. She might as well try one last gambit to win her old friend over.
“I think it might be even more than that,” she said finally. “I think … I think the Fallen is awake. I think he’s behind everything that’s happening here in the Provinces. And the Ire boy might just be our best chance at surviving him.”
Her old friend shook his head. “I always knew you didn’t take the Book of Ages seriously, but this? The Fallen God, awake? A backwoods Provincial boy, our best hope to defeat a god, when we have the might of the Silent Sisters and their Councils behind us? Please reconsider, Jaina. You know what they are capable of.”
Jaina loomed over him. “I ought to kill you for this. But for days past, for the love I had for you, and that Welitan had for you … you will be gone by nightfall, do you understand?”
He nodded, and she stood. She stared him in the eye as he gained his feet and said again, “Sisters damn you, Jeric. You, of all people.”
Propping himself up on one arm, he wiped some of the blood from his mouth and chin. “Whether I was wise to come here or not, I am your friend. I am doing this for you, not them. I will give you the money, if that appeases you. Please, Jaina. Come with me.”
She smiled at him, but inside felt cold as ice. “Be gone by nightfall.”
Emrael stood shoulder to shoulder with Jaina in a hastily erected tent in the woods just a few miles from Larreburgh. Two Captains First from the Ire Legion, Garrus and Worren, stood on the other side of the small table, inspecting the large map of the surrounding area by the light of two dimmed infusori coils. Timan had planted himself near the door of the tent, one hand resting on the hilt of his sheathed sword. Crickets chirped in the cool evening air, barely audible over the sounds of the Ire Legion camp around them.
Toravin was still out leading a host of scouts, where he would stay through the attack. It was imperative that word didn’t reach any of the nearby Watcher garrisons until after they secured Larreburgh, and that Emrael’s forces receive word early if any approached.
Three thousand Ire men had been left with Halrec after two thousand had died or been injured in the fight to defend Whitehall. Halrec would follow with a small force and a group of Ire Legion engineers within two days, but five battalions were what Emrael had to work with against a walled town garrisoned by nearly an equal number of Watchers and Tarelle guardsmen.
Emrael and his five thousand had reached their current position outside the city in just under a week, encountering only a few Watcher patrols, which they had killed or captured. They had taken most of a day to rest the men and scout the enemy defenses.
“Are we going to send a messenger to Lord Holder Tarelle?” Worren Duraec, an Iraean with grey peppering the sides of his short-cropped hair, looked to Emrael. “They must have had some word of our army, but their gates stayed open during daylight hours. They don’t seem to be preparing for fight.”
Worren had been a Watcher Captain before joining Dorae and Toravin’s Whitehall rebellion several years ago. Like Toravin, he had then turned brigand until the call for men to assault the Citadel in Myntar went out from Whitehall. He had quickly proven himself one of Emrael’s best officers, ferocious and clever as a wolf. He and a single battalion of Ire men had taken half of Myntar nearly by themselves, according to Toravin. Toravin and Halrec seemed to take his advice as pure truth, which was all Emrael needed to trust him as well. For the most part.
Emrael made a clicking sound with his tongue before responding. “He already rebuffed Dorae’s attempts to communicate. Do you think sending a messenger now would do any good?”
The other Captain First, Garrus Imarin, a dependable Sagmynan with far more experience in engineering and administrative matters than fighting, answered stoutly. “No, Lord Ire.”
Emrael nodded. “Then we don’t give him any more warning. We don’t approach as supplicants. We take the city with four of our five battalions, each entering at a different point. We’ll attack the Watcher barracks, two outposts, and the Watcher command building”—he paused to point them out on the map—“but we leave Tarelle’s men alone unless they join the fight.”
“Quite a risk,” Timan murmured. “The Watchers reportedly have three thousand men here, Tarelle has nearly that many. Why risk letting Tarelle decide the outcome of the battle when we could incapacitate them all with a surprise assault?”
Emrael acknowledged the question with an approving smile. “I don’t just need to win here, Timan. I need Tarelle’s men to join us afterward. We may be forced to fight them, but we will keep Tarelle’s men out of the fighting for as long as we can. Besides, I’m hoping we can neutralize the Lord Holder without much of a fight if we quickly eliminate the Watcher forces.”
Timan just shrugged, but Worren nodded in approval, as did Jaina.
He pointed at his serious Sagmynan Captain. “Your battalion will hold back from the initial assault, Garrus. The squads assigned to secure the walls will signal when we have engaged the Watchers. Go straight for Tarelle’s palace, don’t stop for anything. Take the Lord Holder and his family prisoner and secure the palace. Do not engage the Watchers until we’ve all arrived.”
Garrus’s eyes crinkled with concern, but he saluted with little hesitation. Emrael watched the Sagmynan for a moment, trying to gauge the man. He held no illusions that he loved him. But thus far, he had obeyed without complaint, and the Sagmynans listened when he talked. Emrael suspected that the unassuming Captain First was likely the key to keeping the Sagmynans in his Legion loyal.
“Jaina will have her Stonebreakers and their support teams ready in blacked-out gear at the first hour past midnight. Each of you will wait on the Imperators assigned to you before getting close to the walls. You know your objectives once they get you in. I’ll see you at the Lord Holder’s palace.”
The thick timber-and-steel gates of Larreburgh stood tightly shut as Emrael and his battalion trotted up the tree-lined cobblestone highway in full view of the Watchers lining the city walls, though the defenders could likely only see an indistinguishable mass of men in the near darkness. Faint blue light from the waning moon concealed as much as it revealed, and the fires burning in large metal braziers atop the battlements and at regular intervals just outside the walls served only to light the ground in the immediate vicinity of the city. They marched in darkness, revealing nothing to the fire-blind guards atop the walls.
Jaina rode at his side, having opted to grant Timan command of one of the four battalions attacking other parts of the city. At about six hundred paces, just out of range of even infusori-powered crossbows, Emrael jammed on his helmet and dismounted his horse. He unlatched his small round shield from where he had tied it to his saddle and lashed it to his left arm.
The other officers followed suit, dismounting to don their gear and join their men, who all marched afoot with shields at the ready. A rudimentary siege engine had been constructed by his engineers, a great wheeled contraption with a steel-sheeted roof to shield the men who pushed it.
Emrael jogged back to find to his assault team. Each of the four battalions attacking the city had one hundred men among them dressed all in black even down to their boots, carrying small shields also painted black. They had even rubbed their faces and hands with charcoal to blend into the shadows of the night. Three Imperators accompanied each blacked company, one Stonebreaker and two more to guard him while he worked. All had satchels full of glowing infusori coils. They were the true assault plan—the siege engine and assault on the gates would be largely for show.
Satisfied that the company would not give themselves away approaching the city walls, he gave them their orders, and they filed quietly into the trees.
He stalked forward, making a show of giving his orders. “Engine at the ready!” he shouted as he approached the front ranks. “Crossbows and shields at two hundred paces.”
The jingle of equipment and the muttered curses of anxious soldiers marching to battle disturbed the silence of the night.
Panicked shouts echoed and horns wailed atop Larreburgh’s walls in answer. Watchers in blue streamed onto the ramparts, their shadows dancing in the light of the braziers. Fire arrows were lit in the braziers as Emrael and his men drew within bow range of the wall, and no doubt buckets of pitch were waiting for the siege engine above the gate.
Emrael called for a halt, and his men huddled behind overlapped shields. Just a year ago, most of these men had been farmers and tradesmen, or had been his enemies. Now they fought side by side, veterans of more battles than most career soldiers in the Provinces.
He and Jaina walked out from behind their line of shields. Emrael held a white flag above his head to signal that he wanted to parley, and Jaina carried a large infusori coil lamp fitted atop a wooden pole to ensure that the defenders of Larreburgh could see it clearly. Two soldiers accompanied each with oversized shields at the ready should the men of Larreburgh decide to ignore the white flag.
When they were close enough, some one hundred paces from both their lines and the wall, Emrael stopped to shout, “I am Emrael Ire. I would speak with your Lord Holder.”
His demand was met with silence for a long moment. Just as he thought arrows would be loosed at them, someone in Watcher blue shuffled to the front of the group of men crowding the wall above the gate to shout back. “We know who you are, Ire. Lord Holder Tarelle honors the Unification Accord, unlike you swine at Whitehall. Crawl back the way you came. You’ll have your battle soon enough.”
Emrael chuckled darkly. “I thought you might feel that way,” he yelled through the firelit darkness. “Does no one from the Lord Holder’s guard wish to avoid bloodshed? All we ask is that you open the gates and stand aside. Our quarrel is with Corrande, not our fellow Iraeans. Any who wish to join me are welcome.”
Many of the men atop the wall—those not garbed in Watcher blue—turned to mutter to each other, then stared at the Watchers.
Reaching into his satchel full of charged coils, he drew infusori until his eyes, hair, and scars were glowing blue. He wanted his enemies to know who—and what—was coming for them. “Men of Larreburgh! Any man found fighting with the Watchers will be treated as one. Any who stands aside or aids us will be allowed to join our ranks when we have taken the city. Choose wisely.”
With that, they trotted back to their line, their men with shields covering their retreat. Much to his relief, no arrows flew at them as they rejoined their battalion. When they were out of immediate danger, Emrael pushed most of the infusori he held back into the coils so that he no longer glowed. Intimidation was all well and good, but he didn’t intend to get shot tonight.
“Engine forward!” he bellowed as he walked among the nine hundred men still with him, not looking to the north to where the Imperator Stonebreaker was hopefully already doing his work. “Crossbowmen prepare to loose! Shields and pikes at the ready! On my command.”
They went to stand behind the ranks of shields and crossbowmen who took aim at the men on the walls. The siege engine rumbled forward, propelled by forty of their burliest men who huddled beneath the engine’s low metal roof. An equal number shuffled along to either side, large shields and spears ready to defend their engine-pushing friends. All had been offered triple pay for a year to risk themselves in the assault on the gate.
Just before the siege engine reached the gate, Emrael screamed, “Loose!” Hundreds of crossbow strings snapped, sending bolts streaming through the darkness to rain down on the defenders above the gate.
The sharp front wedge of the siege engine collided with the gate with a resounding crash of splitting timber and tearing steel. The men pushing the engine hauled backward and prepared for another charge as a continuous stream of arrows, crossbow bolts, and throwing spears were hurled at them. The vast majority of them hit the steel roof with a clang or lodged into the shields of the men skirting the engine, but here and there a scream of pain erupted where one snuck through or a Watcher’s infusori-Crafted crossbow sent a bolt clean through a wooden shield. Not for the first time, Emrael made a mental note to talk to Ban and the Legion engineers about a design for shields that could protect against such attacks, and still be light enough to carry and fight with.
His men continued to reload and loose crossbows of their own. Some of them were even the infusori-Crafted variety, either stolen from vanquished Watchers or part of the batch Ban and his Crafters at the Citadel had built. Even at this distance, many struck home. Bolt-ridden bodies littered the firelit ground in front of the gate and walls, and most wore Watcher blue. They wouldn’t win the battle this way, but they were keeping the defenders at bay.
As the retreating siege engine revealed the gate, Emrael was surprised by the amount of damage done with just one collision. He hadn’t put much faith in a siege engine built so hastily by his engineers, who had carted the steel portions of the contraption in wagons that had slowed them down considerably, but he would have to reward them. It might only take another few blows to break the gate open. This assault was looking like it would go even better than he had hoped.
Emrael was peripherally aware of his men—half of them—leaving the battlefield squad by squad to slink through the woods toward where the Imperators and the first company had disappeared earlier.
The engine smashed into the gate a second time, and one side hung askew, secured by a single hinge. He hadn’t planned to charge the gate this early, but he wasn’t opposed to taking advantage of fortuitous circumstances.
Just as he opened his mouth to order his men ready for the charge, however, the Watchers above poured several large cauldrons of pitch onto the siege engine. He watched in horror as several Watchers loosed fire arrows immediately, engulfing the siege engine in flames. Though the contraption had been designed to protect the men from just this eventuality, several of his men ran screaming from beneath the inferno. The Watchers shot mercilessly, loosing more bolts and arrows into the fleeing men, who had dropped their shields to escape the fire. The siege engine and the bodies of many of the men who had manned it now lay abandoned in front of the gate.
Emrael took a few involuntary steps forward, his heart aching for the men who had just been burned alive for him, on his orders. Jaina took one look at his face and immediately wrapped an arm around his waist, pulling him back from the front line of shields. “You will not risk yourself, Emrael. Let your soldiers do their jobs.”
Emrael grunted at her, then took up an infusori-Crafted crossbow that had been dropped by one of the wounded. Not all of Larreburgh’s defenders had aimed at the siege engine—more and more bolts flew their way now that the engine had been destroyed. Training the crossbow on a Watcher atop the wall, he squeezed the trigger with a smooth, practiced motion and watched as his bolt raced through the darkness to take the Watcher in the chest.
He reloaded the crossbow and loosed again, and again, exhausting a full quiver of twenty or so bolts. Nearly every bolt took a Watcher in the chest, and soon they began to look for cover.
He ditched his crossbow for a shield and moved back out of harm’s way, ordering the men around him to do the same. At that point, their efforts didn’t matter anymore. Thousands of Emrael’s men had already entered the city via gaps created in the city wall by his Imperator Stonebreakers. Pillars of smoke and tall pyres of flame licked the sky in various spots in the city. As he watched, several of his squads, all clad in black, stormed the walls on either side of the gate. In just moments, they had control of the wall, the Watchers defending it either dead or taken captive.
Emrael ordered the men that remained with him forward, and one of the Imperators on the wall shouted down, “A thousand paces to the north, Meran brought down an entire section of the wall. Turned it to sand mostly, men on horse should be able to get through. We have the walls but there’s fighting near the Watcher headquarters.”
The plan had worked. His captains and sergeants began shouting orders at their men, and all but a few squads designated to recover their wounded trotted after Emrael.
When they reached the opening, Emrael couldn’t help but be impressed. The five-pace-wide gap in the wall was a perfectly uniform rectangle. The sections of the wall still standing on either side ended abruptly in smooth-cut stone, finer than any stonemason could have done.
“Absent Gods,” Emrael whispered, running his hands along the smooth stone as his men filed past him. He might be able to wield significant amounts of infusori, but he couldn’t imagine replicating this level of precision. When he used infusori to break stone, it was nearly always a haphazard, destructive affair.
Jaina clapped him on the back. “You have much to learn, Emrael.” She chuckled as she joined the Ire Legionmen filing through the gap and into the brick-walled storehouse that stood on the other side of the wall.
“Well, maybe I need to be training with your Imperators more instead of the exercises you make me do every day,” he grumbled as they made their way through the broken-down doors of the storehouse to where his men had formed ranks in the square on the other side.
Jaina smacked his helmet. “My exercises are responsible for your gains in strength and control, Emrael. They are what you need to stay alive. The skill work can come later.”
He chuckled. “Fine, fine. Let’s get this over with.”
Five hundred strong, they marched down a wide stone-paved avenue that led to the square where the Lord Holder’s palace sat, passing several empty intersections along the way. They saw very few people about, and those they did see scurried out of the way of the marching soldiers. The citizens of Larreburgh were wisely locked up in their homes, but Emrael had expected more resistance than this from the Watchers, even after they had taken the walls.
Just as he thought they might march straight to the Lord Holder’s palace without a fight, the ringing of swords on metal, the thump of wooden shields, and the screams of wounded men reached his ear.
“Fast march,” he called out. They picked up the pace, trotting toward the sounds of battle until they arrived at a large square ringed with merchants’ stalls, a large fountain in the middle. Roughly five hundred men in the drab green of the Ire Legion fought an equal number of well-organized Watchers. As he watched, the Watcher shield-bearers shifted and retracted a step, all at the same time. A volley of infusori-enhanced crossbow bolts immediately whistled between their opened shield wall to tear through the front ranks of Iraeans. Shields burst apart before the power of the Watchers’ crossbows, clouds of blood misted into the air, and men fell thrashing, screaming.
“Shields locked, flank left!” Emrael roared to be heard over the death screams of the wounded. His men locked shields and moved to flank the Watchers at a deliberate march. Just before they reached the side of the Watchers’ square formation, Emrael shouted again. “Charge! Three ranks! Hold three ranks!”
His men shouted as they ran, surging forward to slam into the waiting Watchers. They pushed the Watchers back several steps, as the Watchers were only two men deep on the sides, having committed the majority of their men to the front ranks.
“Push! For Glory’s sake, push or we die!” Emrael shouted again. If they gave the Watchers space to maneuver their crossbowmen behind the shields, they’d suffer the same fate as the poor Iraean companies who had just been decimated to their right.
His men thrust spears over shields and jabbed short swords under them. Blood pooled on the cobblestones as soldiers fell on both sides of the shield wall. Emrael had the numbers, however, and inch by inch they pushed the Watchers into a tighter formation.
A command was shouted behind the Watcher lines, unintelligible over the deafening sounds of battle, though Emrael stood near the front of his battle line. The Watchers pulled back suddenly, shifting their shields out of the way for a volley of crossbow bolts, but his men were ready. The Ire Legion pushed forward immediately, jamming the Watchers’ shields and knocking them off balance.
“Push!” he shouted again as they shoved the Watcher line back farther. The Watchers were giving ground and losing men quickly, at least here on the flank, but still they held. Damn, but they were disciplined. He needed to break through somewhere; this stalemate was costing him dearly in time and lives.
He growled in frustration as he watched the front ranks of Watchers to their right contract again, shifting so their crossbowmen could decimate the Ire men fighting on that side of the square yet again. Whatever Captain was in charge of that contingent hadn’t figured out how to counter the tactic yet.
He slapped Jaina’s shoulder to get her attention, then pointed to the Ire Legionmen to the right, who were inching backward, close to breaking ranks after being hit with infusori-Crafted crossbow volleys twice in the space of a few minutes. She nodded, and Emrael tapped three of the squad leaders waiting in reserve. “You three squads on me, shields up, two ranks. We’re going to take command of the men on the right flank.”
Emrael found the Captain Second nearest him and transferred command to him, telling him to hold the line and press forward as they had been until they saw him break through on the right flank, at which point he was to send his reserve to the rear flank and push the line as hard as possible.
The three squads jogged out from behind their ranks into the empty space between them and the formation of Ire men to the right. Emrael made sure to move at an angle relative to the Watcher formation. A few crossbow bolts still thumped into the shields of their small group, but thank Mercy they were far enough away and held their shields at such an angle that none pierced through.
The ranks of the other Iraean formation opened quickly to let them through. Emrael strode to the nearest man with the metal rivets of a Captain he could find—a Captain Third—and seized him by his chest plate, pulling him close to shout, “Who in Glory’s name is in charge here?”
The Captain’s eyes widened in outrage momentarily, but the blood drained from his face as he realized who shouted at him.
He pointed mutely at a man a hundred paces away who wore the armor of a Captain Second. Emrael vaguely recognized him as a Sagmynan, but didn’t know much more about him. The Captain appeared to be arguing with an Imperator rather than commanding his men despite the battle raging just a dozen paces from them. The Imperator looked ready to do murder.
“Absent Gods damn him,” Emrael growled, already running toward the Captain Second. The man noticed Emrael just as he reached him. Emrael didn’t hesitate a moment, grabbing him roughly by his chest plate and shoving him toward the back ranks. “You’re relieved of your command, Captain.”
Emrael pointed his finger at the Imperator, who now had a smug smile on his face. “You, Mage! You now command these men. Jaina and I are going to lead our thirty in a wedge straight up the middle of your battle line, you follow damn quick on our heels with the entire reserve, understand? Press them so they can’t shoot at us.”
The Imperator’s smile vanished and he saluted sharply. “Yes, Lord Ire.”
Emrael strapped his shield to his arm and formed up with his three squads, him at the point, and Jaina to his right, where he’d be most vulnerable when they attacked. The battle raged much as it had, Watchers and the Ire Legion locked in a desperate struggle. Eventually, one side would become exhausted and fall.
He rapped his sword against his shield three times, and his thirty men responded with their own rattle of steel on wood. They were ready. His hand tightened around his sword hilt as he shouted, “Move! Make way!”
With tired, jerky motions, the exhausted men just in front of them pulled back from the fight, forming a shield-lined gap just wide enough for the wedge to fit through. The Watchers at the front lurched forward into the sudden gap, breaking their line slightly.
“For Ire and glory!” Emrael bellowed as he launched into a sprint.
As he hit the first line of Watcher shields with his own, he kept his legs under him and pushed with all his might, unleashing a burst of infusori to fuel his effort. Two Watchers who had met his charge with overlapped shields were thrown from their feet, tumbling back into the second line so hard that a few of them stumbled as well.
Emrael did not slow. He hit the second line of Watcher shields like a battering ram, throwing another blue-clad enemy soldier to the ground. He darted into the opening in their shield wall, already arcing a fluid strike of his sword into the Watcher to his right, opening a gruesome gash in his side as he passed through.
And then he was among the Watcher reserves, most of whom held crossbows. They hesitated, unable to shoot their weapons for fear of hitting their comrades.
Taking advantage of their confusion, he thrust into the throat of one, then the unarmored armpit of the next. Emrael kept his shield to his left and trusted Jaina to watch his back. Shouts of dismay surrounded him as he flowed from one Watcher to the next, striking farther into the heart of the unprepared Watcher reserves.
Finally he slowed, tired and aware that his men would not be able to keep up if he pushed too far into the enemy ranks. He struck at the man nearest him, but this one, an officer, was ready for him. The Watcher officer parried and slid to the side, lunging quickly at Emrael with a long dagger he held in his other hand. Emrael, slowed by exhaustion, brought his shield up too slowly. The man’s blade carved a line of agony across his forehead before Emrael managed to knock the man away with his shield.
Blood sheeted down Emrael’s face, nearly blinding his left eye. He blocked again with his shield as the officer lunged, then feinted with his sword and brought the shield up to catch the man under the chin with the steel rim. Bone and teeth crunched at the impact and the Watcher fell to one knee. Emrael pulsed infusori through his blade as he followed quickly with a finishing thrust. His sword punched through steel plate and leather armor with a satisfying crunch.
Though the fight with the officer had taken only a moment, a shiver ran down his back as he realized that dozens of Watchers now surrounded him and he couldn’t see Jaina or his own men anywhere.
Panic spurred him to a frenzy. He kicked a nearby shield-bearing Watcher to the ground, then whipped his sword in a brutal arc, dipping low as he did, slashing three nearby crossbowmen across the lower torso. Coils of innards flopped to the ground, and the men fell screaming their death throes. Their comrades drew back and formed a haphazard shield wall here in the midst of their formation, with fear plain on their faces as Emrael bashed his shield with his sword and roared at them.
“Fight, you Watcher bastards! Fight and die!”
Then Jaina caught up to him, and the survivors of his three squads. They overlapped their shields with his, pulling him into a protective formation whether he wanted it or not. He didn’t. He wanted to cut his way through the enemy, to feel their blood spray his face, run down his sword and over his hand, slick the stones beneath his boots. Even his own exhaustion and his own blood oozing down his face did nothing to deter him. With infusori and battle joy storming through him, he was death incarnate.
Good sense finally prevailed over his instincts, and he snuck a glance behind him. He was relieved to see that the opening he had created in the enemy shield wall had turned the battle into a full rout. Watchers all around him threw down their shields and ran before the tide of Ire Legionmen, a flood of blue uniforms fleeing before a wave of green. Knots of blue-clad men were caught between the converging sides of his men and threw down their weapons in surrender, screaming their pleas for mercy.
As the battle rage began to drain from Emrael, weariness took its place. He pulled back behind the front lines and tossed his shield and helmet to the ground. He cleaned and sheathed his sword, then motioned to a squad leader who waited with the few reserves who had not chased the fleeing Watchers.
“Send officers out to ensure the men grant quarter. We’ll not slaughter any who surrender.”
The sergeant saluted, relayed the message to his squad, and all left at a sprint to shout the orders.
Jaina found Emrael in the aftermath of the battle and gripped his head between her hands to inspect his wound. Judging by the amount of blood still running down his face, he must have had quite the gash. She called for a Mage-Healer, but he put a hand on her arm to stop her. “Leave it. There are men that need their Healing far worse than I. I can make do with just a bandage for now. It’ll do the Legion good to see that I fight alongside them.”
“I don’t think they’ll mistake you for an aristocrat,” she said, looking him up and down.
Blood soaked his leather and plate armor and the clothing underneath. His boots squelched when he stepped. He shrugged. “We need to get to the main square. Who knows what the other groups have run into. Everything hinges on us neutralizing the Watchers and taking Tarelle’s palace quickly.”
He sat briefly while Jaina took a bandage wrap from one of their men and wound it around his head for him. Once he had sat a moment and had some water from his canteen, he started to feel bone-weary. All too soon, however, she clapped him on the shoulder and offered her hand to help him up. He took it and lurched to his feet, already shouting orders.
In a few short minutes, hundreds of captive Watchers had been secured, the wounded were being cared for, and he was at the head of eight hundred or so of the Ire Legion who could still march to the city center. With luck, his four other such groups had succeeded similarly and would be converging on the Watcher headquarters as well.
As they drew near the Lord Holder’s square, the sounds of men shouting were clear, but were not accompanied by the clamor of weapons, shields, and screams that Emrael would have expected. He grew more and more curious until they finally reached the point where the avenue exited into the main square.
Five or so of his squads formed a shield wall at the entrance to the square, blocking any unwanted forces from entering. They moved aside as soon as they recognized their fellow Ire Legionmen.
Two full battalions of Ire men lined up across the entire breadth of the square, facing a formation of Watchers of perhaps half their strength twenty paces away. Now that Emrael had arrived with what remained of his battalion, the Watchers were outnumbered drastically. He recognized Timan and Worren leading these two battalions, but where was that fourth battalion, and Garrus with the reserves? He might not need them even if this came to a fight, but they might have helped him intimidate the Watchers into surrender.
The Ire Legionmen guarding the avenue recognized Emrael after he pulled his helmet off. They cheered, “Ire! Ire! Ire!”
The men following Emrael took up the cheer, and soon those gathered in the square echoed it as well, slamming shields and spear butts against the cobblestones of the great square to accentuate the thunderous chanting.
He strode straight to where the two forces faced each other, thousands of men at his back and Jaina at his side. A year ago, he had been a destitute outcast, and now his own Legion cheered his name.
The Ire shield wall parted as he pushed through. He put his helmet back on and held his shield at the ready, aware that just one crossbow bolt could end him. Jaina, Timan, and a full squad of Imperators flanked him to either side.
He strode to the center of the clear space between the two forces and raised his sword in the air. The chanting from his men stopped so he could be heard. “I want to speak with your commanders,” he called into the sudden silence. “I prefer to avoid further bloodshed.”
A ripple shimmered through the ranks of Watchers, who stared death in the face. They knew as well as Emrael did that either they could surrender now, or they could fight, lose, and the survivors would surrender afterward.
He waited a moment to let them comprehend what was happening, then shouted again, addressing the soldiers—those who would do the fighting, the dying. “You don’t need to die. My quarrel is not with you, but with your commanders. Turn over your commander and senior staff, and any of you who wish may join my Legion. You will receive pay and a land bounty like any other Ire Legionman. All others will be granted quarter and treated fairly.”
An immediate murmur rose among the men in blue, and more shifting of shields. The Watchers were professional soldiers, well trained and equipped. Most had likely only seen real fighting along the Ithan frontier, however, and even then only small skirmishes with mercenaries who wanted nothing to do with the military might of the Provinces. Most of them were used to bullying Iraeans and others who never stood a chance against them in battle. They had never stared at men ready and able to slaughter them as they did now.
The murmur among the Watchers grew louder, and Emrael saw movement in the back ranks near the command building, where the senior officers likely still hid while sending their men out to die. Abruptly, the Watcher shield wall opened and three men in blue officer dress uniforms were tossed from among the ranks into the courtyard. None of the three were armed or even armored, and their clothes were mussed from the abrupt manhandling.
Emrael dragged his sword point lightly on the cobblestones as he strode toward the men. They panicked, kicking and scrabbling at the shield wall to be let back in, but the Watchers held firm, even shoving the officers with their shields. He waited until the three faced him—well, him and the twelve Imperators at his back. Fear was clear in their eyes. They knew their fate.
“Take them,” Emrael said calmly to the Imperators, belying the fury he felt at the sight of these men who had oppressed the Iraean people at the point of a sword for decades. “There will be a trial, and the Lord Holder will have his say.”
He was now close enough to look the Watcher soldiers still holding their shield wall in the eye. He called out to them. “The rest of you, put down your weapons and shields. You will not be harmed.”
The Watchers hesitated, but first a few men in the front rank threw down their shields and swords, then all of them seemed to follow at once. Emrael smiled amid the metallic thunder of shields and swords hitting the cobblestones.
Larreburgh belonged to him.
Early the next morning, Emrael, Jaina, and their entourage of Ire Legion officers and Imperators exited the Lord Holder Garan Tarelle’s palace just as the sun peeked over the Duskan Mountains. The red-gold light revealed a large gibbet that had been erected overnight in the middle of the square.
They’d only managed about an hour of sleep after the city had been secured and his wound had finally been tended to. Jaina and her Imperators had insisted on checking Tarelle and everyone of any importance for mindbinders before resting but hadn’t found any. Her theory was that whichever Malithii priest had discovered that Craft had not shared the knowledge with the others and must be using them only for matters of great importance. Not for the first time, he got the sense that this war with the Malithii and Corrande was larger in scope than he dared imagine. Absent Gods help him.
Emrael’s eyes were bloodshot and grainy, as were Jaina’s. His muscles were stiff and his head pulsed with pain, especially the stitched-up wound on his forehead. The city and his Legion needed today’s events more than any of them needed sleep, however.
The Ire Legion filled the large square with tidy ranks, including those that had defected from the Watchers and Tarelle’s guard the night before. The new recruits had been assigned to Ire Legion squads, and he wanted them lined up with their units for the events of the day. Today would separate them from their old loyalties for good.
The vast majority of the Watchers in the city—nearly fifteen hundred of them—had surrendered, and most of those who had remained at the Watcher command building rather than join the battle in the city were native Iraeans, pressed into service and quick to join Emrael’s Legion when they learned who had taken the city. They had already shed their Watcher blues and donned their civilian clothes. A substantial number of Lord Holder Tarelle’s men had joined Emrael when given the chance as well, something the Lord Holder had not been happy about. Emrael now had close to seven thousand men under his command in Larreburgh despite the losses in the attack.
Some five hundred or so Watchers who had surrendered but had not joined Emrael—native Corrandians, for the most part, judging by the scorn in their eyes and the pale hair prominent among their people—had been stripped of their blues as well, but these sat near the gibbet with elbows bound behind their backs, guarded by an equal number of flat-eyed Ire Legionmen. So long as they didn’t fight or try to escape, Emrael and his men would honor the quarter they had granted. But he wanted them to see today’s proceedings up close.
Townsfolk milled about the square as well. Emrael’s soldiers had posted a notice at every square that there would be an announcement at sunrise in front of the Lord Holder’s palace, and that the townsfolk would not be harmed.
Emrael climbed the platform next to the gibbet just as Lord Holder Tarelle was escorted from his palace by Timan and a squad of Emrael’s men. The Imperator flashed a wicked grin at Emrael as he shepherded the nervous Lord Holder along.
Next came the three Watcher senior officers, guarded by another squad. The show was about to start. He raised an infusori-Crafted speaking cone and addressed the gathered crowd.
“People of Larreburgh—my fellow Iraeans. My name is Emrael Ire, son of Janrael Ire, and grandson of the late King Konrael Ire. The blood of your fellow free Iraeans and Sagmynans has freed you from the tyranny of Corrande and the Watchers.”
A few scattered cheers rose in the crowd. Many of his men stood proud but stone-faced, likely remembering their fallen comrades. Emrael himself had helped cart the bodies of their dead inside the captured Watcher compound for hours last night. This attack had been necessary to show their strength and coerce another Lord Holder into joining them, but it had been costly. Nearly a thousand of his men had been killed, and even a resounding victory was little consolation when your brother, or cousin, or friend had just died next to you, screaming and crying with a sword in his gut.
But, they had killed or captured nearly four times as many Watchers as their losses, and bolstered their numbers with new recruits besides. For the first time, Emrael felt real hope that his insane plan to conquer Iraea might actually work.
He lifted the speaking Crafting back to his mouth. “Lord Holder Tarelle has decided to join Lord Holder Norta and me in repelling the Watchers and reclaiming our once-great kingdom.”
More cheers rose, and the Legionmen battered their shields with drawn swords just as they had the night before.
“Those that have wronged us will pay for their crimes, starting today.”
At that, the three Watcher officers were forced onto the platform beneath the gibbet. A low roar erupted from the gathered townsfolk when a noose was fitted around each of their necks. The Watchers had notoriously been quick to deal harshly with any Iraeans that fell afoul of Provincial Law—a legal code that did little to protect the conquered Iraeans, particularly any who could not pay what the Corrandes and Watchers demanded as a retributory tax for a war that had ended nearly half a century ago. These three officers would have sent hundreds of Iraeans to the gallows in their time commanding the Watcher forces in the Tarelle Holding.
The townsfolk, most in humble garb, pressed forward. His men let them come. The roar of the crowd grew louder and louder as they realized it was safe to openly oppose the Watchers for the first time in decades.
One of the Watcher officers began to sob and cry for mercy. Justice didn’t feel very just when you were the one about to swing.
Emrael turned back to the roaring crowd and raised his voice. “How many of our people have suffered at the hands of these men? How deaf have they been to your cries?”
He motioned sharply, and his men pushed the Watcher officers from the platform to dangle by their necks. Their feet kicked, their bodies jerked, and Emrael could faintly hear them rasping as they strangled. Jaina, of all people, stared at him with a worried look on her face as he watched them die. Soon, the Watchers swung lifeless from the gallows and were cut down unceremoniously.
A collective gasp and not a few angry murmurs erupted from the townsfolk—and even some from his own men—when the next captive was led from the Lord Holder’s palace to the gallows. A sweating, nervous old man in the elaborate robes of a Sentinel priest was forced up to the platform. Even the Legionmen who had just hanged the officers without hesitation now grimaced, eyes downcast as they fitted the noose around the Sentinel’s neck.
Emrael raised the speaking cone again, glaring at his men and the muttering crowds as the Sentinel priest stood below the gibbet. “You would spare this man, after hanging the Watchers that follow his orders? This man is the one hoarding the money stolen from you. This man is the one fueling the Provinces’ hatred of us and our heritage. You fear him because you think he speaks for the Gods? There are no Gods, or they’ve abandoned us to our fate. Our ancestors knew this, and I know this. It’s time you learned it.”
He strode to the gallows and shoved the shrieking priest off himself, then watched him dangle and squirm at the end of the rope.
“Our bondage has ended!” Emrael shouted, no longer bothering with the Crafted cone. “Men and women are needed to fight, to defend our land once more! My Legion will be taking volunteers for the rest of the day here in the square. Any who can fight or support our army will be well rewarded with gold and land in our captured territories. Iraea will soon be ours again!”
A cheer rose from the crowd, both his men and most of the townsfolk, though a noticeable portion of the townspeople—those in the brighter garb of merchants, especially—drifted away quietly, likely trying to leave town as quickly as they could. Just as well that they did—Emrael wanted word of what had happened here to spread far and wide.
He now had Whitehall and Larreburgh firmly within his control, and soon it would be time to bind the rest of the Lords of Iraea to him. They couldn’t afford to ignore him, now.